Speech Therapy Ideas to Overcome Stuttering Quickly and Easily

Stuttering or stammering is a speech disorder wherein the person repeats certain letters or syllables, which disrupts the smooth flow of words. It is difficult at times to understand what the person means because of this condition. Sometimes, a person suffering from this disorder tends to have inferiority in expressing himself to others because he is afraid to get laughed at. This is the reason why many speech therapy ideas had been developed over the years to help people overcome stuttering.

The first exercise is reading aloud. Although this may sound very simple to you, to people who are constantly stuttering, this is quite a challenge. It would be better to have two materials ready. One is an audio that the person can listen to and learn the right pronunciation, diction, and phrasing of the words in the selection. Give the person a written copy of the same material and let him read this after listening to the audio. Constant practice of this skill will help the person to pronounce the words clearly and practice speaking the words straight.

You can also try playing games to make learning a bit more fun and less awkward especially to adult participants who may find it embarrassing to be undergoing these sessions at their age. Participants can first learn tongue twisters, which are generally sentences with difficult words to pronounce. This may also include alliterations with every first letter of the word in each sentence being the same. Each participant can then take turns to recite these tongue twisters and for those that get these right, will get a prize.

On the other hand, if these two speech therapy ideas are not yet enough, then you can try conversational therapy. As the name implies, this is a simple technique to engage the participant in a natural conversation. The first thing you need to remember when doing this speech therapy is that you have to make the participant feel at home and at ease with his surrounding. Becoming more relaxed will make it easier for the participant to open up and express himself. At first, there might be difficulty in pronouncing the words and saying the sentences straight. However, as time goes by and as you get more practice, there will be improved changes in the speech. You can talk about anything under the sun for as long as you are able to get the person to talk and express himself.

Facial exercise is also one good therapy to improve speech. Most of the time, the muscles in the face have become stiff that they need to be loosened up through the usual facial exercises. You can also massage the face to loosen up the facial muscles around the cheeks and mouth area.

These are just some speech therapy ideas that you can do to help people who are stuttering. It would certainly help them a lot if you practice these more often to see improved changes.